Found a pig farm that said “Historical location.” “Hey!” thought I, “Maybe this is themey!” Maybe it was. Couldn’t make heads or tails of it. No one would talk to me. Did I miss something? Whatever. Moved on.

Found a bandit camp. Killed dudes. Got loot.

Aaaaand that was it.

What is this, Assassin’s Creed: Destiny? This is a damn loot gathering game. I was told this one was story heavy, almost an RPG. With the exception of the plague quest, where, exactly, is this story/RPG shit I heard so much about?

Feminina:

Well, “almost an RPG” probably just means “you have dialogue options and occasionally make a choice about something.” Which we have noted. And dialogue options were certainly never part of AC before, so it’s new and different.

Story, I don’t know. Did you go look for Penelope’s scarf, or whoever? You run into someone there who…might show up again with story?

But dude, I like sneaking and hiding in the bushes and assassinating people, so I’m OK with it so far.

Butch:

That’s what I was going to do but said “Man….just….man….” and magpied. That’s next!

No, the reviews pretty much all said “Wowsers! Story and shit!” (I’m paraphrasing.) Maybe they just meant “By AC standards?” I dunno.

Did you figure out that whole “Historical location: so and so’s pig farm” deal? Or any historical location?

Seems a stretch. I mean, sure, I admit, I didn’t take Greek history or anything, but some pig farm hardly seems historical.

Of course, on that….

You’re the English major. You are well read. Did you read the Odyssey and all that? Cuz I kinda haven’t. Maybe Ulysses went to a pig farm.

Oh, and, to be sure, I got nothing against all the sneaky. It’s good sneaky. But man, it’s been all sneaky all day.

Feminina:

I did find the historic pig farm! I also was not able to make anything of it. Maybe a future quest will involve returning to it to look for…somebody’s great grandfather’s long-lost pig-spear?

I read…one of them. I can’t remember which one. The Iliad, probably, because I don’t remember reading the part about where all Ulysses’ men get turned into pigs by Circe, which is a famous bit of the Odyssey that for no reason at all occurs to me right now. I don’t remember any other reference to pigs in the one I read. I never had either of them in a class, so I just read one that I happened to stumble across, at some later point in life.

Oh, and also I read Ulysses, which is really not relevant but which also occurs to me.

And dude, you don’t HAVE to be all sneaky. Beef up your warrior stats and go tank if you want to just fight. It’s a change of pace, at least.

Butch:

Dude, AC is about sneaky! It’s not called “Tank who gives no fucks’ Creed.”

I did spring for a couple of daggers that do MAD assassin damage and have a crazy attack speed and kill everything. I recommend them.

That future quest better not be the case, unless I get a fast travel point on this damn island.

Though I do like the idea of a pig spear. “We’ve had no bacon since granddad lost the pig spear….we miss bacon.”

Ulysses is not relevant. I read that, too, when I was going through my “I’ll read Joyce to be erudite and shit” phase in college. I blame college professors.

Feminina:

“Daggers! Daggers for everyone!”

I’ll keep an eye out for them.

I also pretty much only read Ulysses to be erudite, or out of curiosity I suppose, although it was long after college, so I can’t blame that. I found parts of it rather nice, but it certainly did go on.

Some assassins could be tanks! We don’t know! This is early days for the organization.

Besides, is Kassandra even an “Assassin” according to the game’s categorization? We’ve certainly never seen her join the club or make any reference to it. I mean, clearly that could be coming in the jam-packed story that will no doubt unfold at any moment, but she’s not now, so she can do whatever she wants, and maybe that’s to be tanky!

Like Edward. He was barely aware of the Assassin/Templar thing, and only glancingly a member of the assassins.

Butch:

Yeah, but Edward’s recruitment/whatever was a big ol’ plot point, remember? It was Mary.

Mary: Edward, I have something to tell you. I’m a woman, and I’m part of an ancient-Edward: You are so not.Mary: Focus, Edward.Edward: You’ve gone mad.Mary: Sigh. What if I put on lipstick? There. That help?Edward: You totally are a woman!Mary: Good. Now that that’s out of the way….I’m part of an ancient order called the Assassins and we’re dealing with this other ancient order and maybe aliens.Edward: Ok. Go on.Mary: Wait, you believed THAT but not that I was a woman?Edward: Well, you weren’t wearing lipstick.

Maybe we’ll get something like that with Kassandra. Markos will put on lipstick or something.

Feminina:

I wouldn’t be at all surprised.

Well, maybe Morkos in lipstick would surprise me a little, but the general outline of the plot, I could totally see.

Butch:

Well, it’s gotta be something. We’re pretty sure the hipsters in the present are, in fact, assassins, yes? So if they’re interested, there’s gotta be a why.

Do you know the why? Cuz I don’t.

Feminina:

I do not. I’m only, like, an hour and a couple of naval skirmishes ahead of you, I know almost nothing.

Insanity has set in. Not really cuz of a lack of game, but because of exhausted children, grumpy grandparents, and the fact that HOLY SHIT I JUST WANT TO EAT A BAG OF CHIPS FUCK THIS SHIT.

So really, fuck it. Fucking Fitbit only says five days a week. I’m gonna lie on the couch and moan quietly to myself.

But, as we wait to see if PS+ will save us 17 bucks, we need something. So I ponder more loose ends:

So we cheer Ethan, right? Police chief calls him a hero? Aren’t we forgetting that….he’s a killer? He MURDERED a guy! Or mine did. Now, does that tie into the whole “Gordi got away with it isn’t that ironic” thing? Ethan got away with it, too? My Kramer also said, of the boy that Gordi killed, “He was just street trash, no one will miss him.” Are we relying on the same thing with Ethan and the drug dealer? Was that supposed to be a parallel?

Or is it just a cop out and and oversight?

MORE LOOSE ENDS!

So after all that work to track down the killer’s car…where the fuck was the killer’s car? WHY DID I DO THAT????

Loose ends.

After Beyond, I said that the more I think about Beyond, the more mixed feelings I have. I have a feeling that the more I think about Heavy Rain the more it’ll piss me off.

Feminina:

Hm. My Ethan never killed anyone. It does seem a bit odd that even if you do commit murder, there are no consequences. You’d think it would be part of the game that “hey, if you’re willing to kill to save your son, you have to accept the fact that you’ll spend some time in jail for it.” But apparently no.

Well…nice work getting away with murder. Gordi too. Maybe it’s a parallel? I’m not sure it seems focused enough to be an intentional one, but…maybe? I don’t think I liked this game enough to give it the benefit of the doubt, though, honestly.

When did you track down the killer’s car? I don’t remember tracking down the killer’s car! Which, if I didn’t do it, definitely suggests it was unnecessary filler.

Butch:

Me, neither on willingness to extend the benefit of the doubt. Just not worth bending themes for. Which is too bad, really. I was expecting a better narrative.

But we’re not playing anything right now, so I’m grasping. I’m trying here, Femmy!

Beats exercising. And the kids are home, cuz these are the days between camp and vacation, and help me.

There were the tire tracks at the crime scene, and the whole bit in Mad Jack’s garage, and all those clues that it was an 83 Malibu, a video of it, etc. I guess it was just a way to get us to Mad Jack so we could fight another offensively stereotyped person of color!

This game, man.

Feminina:

Oh man, that’s true. We were so busy griping about other things we never even MENTIONED Mad Jack’s glaring offensiveness, and how it stands out even more considering he was apparently the only black person in the city.

This game really has it all.

This is going to be one of those weeks where we just hunker down and pray for the end, isn’t it?

Butch:

There was just so much to be offended by! SO VERY MUCH!

Didn’t it just have it all? Didn’t it just?

And yet, it drew you in! You lapped it up! You couldn’t get enough of it! What gives?

Pray for the end of what? We’re done!

And if this is an existential reference, remember I’m emotionally delicate due to this “I have to get fit” bullshit. I’m fragile here!

Feminina:

The end of the WEEK, man, the end of the week. Sorry if that sounded more portentous than I meant. We’re only praying for the end of the week. Probably. Or for vacation in your case.

Also, I don’t think it’s fair to say I couldn’t get enough. I couldn’t get to the end FAST enough, that’s true. Because it was an engaging beach game! It did that much well.

But once it was over, I was definitely not thinking “man, I wish I were still playing that game!”

I admit I was thinking “I will totally play Detroit,” but I think that was a result of getting into beach game mode. I was all “I need more tense, fast-paced action that I can race through!”

It’s like when you finish a bag of chips and immediately want another bag of chips, but if you wait a while you realize that maybe another bag of chips is not that great an idea after all, and in fact, even the first bag wasn’t quite as thrilling as you found it while you were in the middle of it.

You didn’t play it fast enough, that’s your problem. You had more time to realize how unpleasant it was while you were still playing. I raced through it so quickly that even though I was cringing at something in every other scene, I always moved on before I could get distracted.

Of course, I was still left reflecting on it LATER, but at least I got more enjoyment out of it at the time. In between cringes.

Butch:

I got too much portent. Too much stress. Planning vacation.

Well, is Detroit still on our list then? Not our “right now” list but our “someday” list? Or did this turn us off David Cage?

That might be it–I went too slowly. It is a lot easier to be critical when you’re letting every cringe sink in.

But still….that ALSO might be a flaw in game design. Some games are designed to make the action go go go go go. Even games with story. Uncharted 4, for example. But in a game that is so obviously, intentionally broken into chapters, you’re almost encouraged to take breaks to ruminate. Shit, the game didn’t even give you the visual signal of mid chapter save points. The only way to be safe was to STOP at a chapter. This game didn’t seem to want you to play it all go go go go go think later. Maybe it should have.

Feminina:

I’m still interested in Detroit, but not in the “must play now” sense. I think Beyond was better than Heavy Rain in many ways–there was still stuff to cringe over, but it wasn’t quite so inescapable and constant (heck, I avoided most of it through QTE failures).

So it’s possible he’s getting better about stuff, and mechanically his games ARE interesting (if sometimes weird), and I’m curious about what he might do next. I think it’s like this: I’d definitely play it for free (and isn’t it mercifully great that we didn’t pay for this?), but I’ll probably read a few reviews before paying for it.

And yeah, maybe it should have been better designed as a go-go-go game, but on the other hand, consider the beach read we keep comparing it to.

Chapters. Short, often cliff-hanger-y chapters, that you sometimes have to stop at the end of to go refill your drink or whatever. I mean, yes, in a sense that encourages rumination, but in another way, it just encourages you to want to get back into it to see what’s next. When you’re standing in line for the bar at the resort, are you really pondering the last chapter you read in that James Patterson thriller, or are you just thinking “can’t wait to get back to the story!”

Oh!–you know what, I think maybe it depends on if you have a blog. Because that’s a major way I had the advantage over you in terms of getting actual enjoyment out of it: I didn’t have any reason to stop and think about it because I knew we weren’t going to discuss it until you played. It was easy for me to think “go-go-go! yes that was annoying/gross/troublesome/awful but let’s see what happens next!”

Whereas you, each time you finished a chapter, got right into the discussion, which means you got right into the (justified) criticism. I mean, there’s no denying this is the kind of game (indeed, the kind of story) you enjoy more if you don’t think about it too much, right?

Well, what’s the blog except a place for thinking about things too much? You were doomed from the beginning, whereas I at least got to be entertained.

Sorry, man.

Butch:

Agreed. I don’t mind the wait for Detroit. It’s likely something that will be free at some point, and, thus, we will get to it. But other things await!

Like LiS Before the Storm. And LiS 2, which is out in September. And Shadow of the TR which we’ve pre ordered. And, lest we forget, the 598274523785 hours of Divinity 2 (which was the reason we played Divinity 1 in the first place) that comes out next week for PS4.

We’ll be fine.

About the beach game…Hmm. Fair point. Except….

We’re calling this a beach game because we felt it was one. I imagine that the folks who write beach read books know full well what they’re doing, and they know that no one is going to ponder too much but who cares as long as the movie rights check clears. David Cage? He was NOT writing a beach game. Or, at the very least, he wasn’t doing it intentionally. This dude Takes. Himself. Seriously. If he read all this, he’d be all “Beach game? BEACH GAME???? How DARE you say that of this MASTERPIECE????”

Strangely, I think the blog has changed the way I think about games, even play them. There have been times in lots of games where I think “Well, I COULD play a little more, but a lot just happened and I want to process all that so I can write about it later.” Maybe I was doing that. Too much.

Eh, whatever. I just got to the cringey truth first.

Feminina:

Heh. I never really thought about it, but yeah, I could see ‘beach game’ being…not exactly the way he intended it. It’s not an insult, exactly, but it doesn’t really suggest Serious Artistic Merit.

And you think he was definitely going for Serious Artistic Merit? It was meant to be a gripping psychological drama instead of a quick whodunnit?

“This is going to be ‘Crime and Punishment’ for our generation!”?

Hm.

That’s interesting, about playing games differently. And a good point. When you know you’re going to be talking about something, you pay more attention to it…or at least pay attention to it in a different way. Like reading a book for a book club, compared to just reading it on your own (not that I’ve ever been in a book club, but so I imagine).

Butch:

I think he was going for something like Crime and Punishment. I’ve read interviews with the guy, and he certainly considers himself to be a Serious Artist, if not the Most Serious Artist in Games.

I think he was aiming for that. He missed, but he was aiming for that.

As for playing differently, there have even been times where something momentous happens early in a playing session, and I cut the session short because I don’t want to forget what I want to say about it. Which I would not do but for the blog. This might come from me being constantly behind, and knowing you well. Like, I’ll say “Ah, this is what she was hinting about” or even just “Man, I KNOW she’s got something to say about this.” And yes, I do find myself paying a bit more attention when Something Is Happening.

I think it’s good. Leads to better thinking about it all. Maybe that’s why people like book clubs.

Feminina:

Yeah, true…about games AND book clubs. I mean, I read a lot of books, and I’ll be honest, I have few deep thoughts about most of them. Which is partly because not every book really prompts deep thoughts, but also because…why bother with deep thoughts if there’s no outlet for them? It’s not as if it’s my JOB to have deep thoughts about books.

I’m not a philosopher. Nor do I have a book blog, which would be another option. I can sit here having deep thoughts about Girl on the Train or whatever, for no real reason since I will never share them, or I can go read another book.

Whereas if I were in a book club, there would be people with whom to share deep thoughts, or even passing thoughts, and so I would be more likely to think them in the first place. “What do I think about this?” is the initiating question, and one that doesn’t even necessarily get asked if I’m just tearing through stuff to keep my brain occupied on the subway.

And the same is kind of true of games. I didn’t bother to have that many thoughts about…uh…that game with the neon–inFamous, thank you internet–because I knew you weren’t going to play it. I’m never going to discuss it in detail, so pretty much what I thought was the minor notes I ended up sticking on the blog. If we’d ever talked about it, no doubt there would be more to say, and we would probably have had clever thoughts about it. Oh well.

So yeah. Good point. We experience things more thoughtfully because we’re going to discuss it. I think this is true. Certainly I will admit that 90% of the books I read I don’t experience thoughtfully at all.

Butch:

Ergo our incredible erudition! We bring out the best in each other!

Well, certainly the most verbose in each other.

Feminina:

DEFINITELY the most verbose.

I was sitting here thinking “man, maybe I’m wasting the experience, not thinking about books more, I read all this stuff and then it’s just gone” but on reflection I don’t feel that bad about it. A game takes a lot more time than a book, so it’s OK to think harder about it.

Not that there probably aren’t in fact lots of interesting discussions to be had about the books I read, if only I had someone to talk about them with, but…I don’t think I have the time to be THAT verbose.

One blog is all I can manage.

Butch:

Well, don’t forget that I don’t read much anymore, what with my lack of public transit usage, so you’d have to get a different blogmate, and, let’s face it, you’ll never find one as good as me.

Or as modest.

Feminina:

It’s true! The in-jokes alone would take years to build up…it’s not even worth it. Plus the lack of modesty would just wreck the whole enterprise.

Butch:

Fuckin’ A.

So today’s the first day in a while I haven’t really exercised, just, you know, taken care of kids.

This fucking thing doesn’t understand the concept of ACTIVE. I’m totally brain fried, and it’s all “You only have 4000 steps. You have no active minutes!”

YOU TAKE CARE OF THE KIDS STUPID FITBIT!

Feminina:

Yeah, computers are stupid like that. I HAVE BEEN ACTIVE! I’ve been back and forth all day with these children! Don’t talk to me about active!

It assumes you’re lounging on the couch playing games. If only, Fitbit. IF ONLY.

Can you placate it by making the kids go for a walk with you, or will they just cause so much stress it will do more harm than good?

Good point. You spend half the time sprinting and the other half standing still while they look at sticks. And then pick up the sticks, and start fighting over the sticks because one of them is obviously better. And hitting each other with the sticks, so you get one active minute intervening and dragging them away from each other.

Good times. Good times.

Butch:

Not useful for physical fitness, that. Or mental fitness.

And can I really just let them sit and watch ipads while I work out? How would that look?

“Here, kids! Do the very thing that led your father to have to do this very thing!”

Even OUR fitness blog wouldn’t suggest that.

Feminina:

Ha! “You guys lounge here and play games while I stride briskly around the track wishing I were lounging and playing games.”

No spoilers for Life is Strange, unless you prefer not to know the main character’s name in advance

Butch:

While we’re talking on narratives, and cheats, are we going to have to talk over and over again about Catcher in the Rye? Are we? Because the reason I was not pointing out that Max, the photographer, the one who NOTICES SHIT MAN is named Caulfield was that a) I knew you got that and b) then we’d have to be all literary and shit.

It’s one reason why I’m leaning, in the previous email, towards “We did this because it has to happen, period.” The Caulfield thing isn’t subtle. They lose subtle points.

Feminina:

Oh, it’s so not subtle…I mean, Caulfield, the talk about phoniness, the disillusion of grown-ups not being trustworthy/competent, the sense of alienation, the NOTICING…I’m kind of with you, let’s just say “noted” and move on.

Unless we run out of other things to discuss.

Butch:

Yup. Indeed, when I learned her last name I think I actually, sarcastically, said “Really?” out loud. I hate that. I mean, if you’re going to take a literally classic as inspiration, fine. That happens all the time. Happens in all art, really. But you don’t have to put a damn neon sign on it. Tell your story, trust smart, liberal arts college educated bloggers to notice the references and influence, move on.

Noted.

It is unlikely we’ll run out of other things to discuss. But as for running out of things we CAN discuss but won’t…..

All through Gone Home, it PAINED me not to talk about the use of music. Now I’m in fucking AGONY man. But I know your response will be something like “Hey man….I noticed that…sometimes…there was….music…I think….”

Feminina:

You know, you can talk about music. I won’t be able to talk back, but your brilliant observations can still be blogged.

Our music-loving followers will appreciate it, even if I don’t.

Butch:

Dude, our whole hook, the only thing that sets us apart is the whole “conversation” aspect. Music will have to just fall to the wayside.

That game changed my whole world view. It was the first game I played that had a story worth a damn. I must’ve spent hundreds of hours with it. Of course, it was on the C64 so most of those were waiting for it to load, but damn. And the creepiness of it coming true in a lot of ways is creepy. This, Fallout, the memories this week!

Feminina:

Interesting. You know, I have yet to actually read that book. I still might, though, whereas I’m pretty much never going to play that game, however intriguing bits of it sound.

Butch:

That’s one of those modern books that everyone should read. It always bugs me when people are listing the must reads of literature and no one puts anything on it newer than Catcher in the Rye. Nothing against the old classics, but there’s stuff being written, people!

Neuromancer is one of the very few books that gets more relevant as it ages. Even the great works, sometimes you have to say “Well, historically this mattered because….” whereas with Neuromancer, each day we get closer to what it predicts. Literally. Indeed, I could make a case that it’s a much more important book today than it was in 1984, but that’s another blog.

As for the game, you’re not going to play it as the only machines that can are all in museums. But it’s always nice to give you, a johnny come lately to games, a glimpse into what was cool back in the day.

(Interesting sound fact: Neuromancer was the first game that brought in famous musicians to make what one might call a score, if one can apply that to C64 sound. New wave band Devo (of “whip it” fame) did the music.)

(Interesting bit re games and narrative: Remember when I said that was the first game that had a story worth a damn? Well, it was made by the now defunct Interplay, but before Interplay went bust, several of the folks who did Neuromancer would come up with a couple other games. One you may have heard of: Fallout. Full circle!)

Feminina:

Yeah, there are many interesting and ‘classic’ books that were written quite recently. Sadly, you can’t make people read everything.

Butch:

Yeah. Plus schools are so afraid of sex and bad words that we’ll never really teach anything good. Sigh.

Feminina:

It’s true, that is another good reason to stick to the OLD classics. Clean language and no explicit naughty behavior!

Butch:

Indeed! We can’t have people learning about sex and violence! That’s why we stick with Madame Bovary and Crime and Punishment.

Feminina:

Yeah! Nice, wholesome tales, where all the bad stuff is concealed behind obscure prose. It’s not that we object to sex and violence as such, you know, there wouldn’t be any reason to judge our neighbors otherwise and what fun would that be? Just don’t talk about it in language that people can easily understand, that’s all I ask.

Butch:

Exactly! All that frilly Shakespeare stuff! I mean, it’s about talking to skulls and that’s it, right? RIGHT?

Feminina:

Shakespeare! Perfect example. Those stories are basically nursery rhymes, safe for all ages. More Shakespeare for everyone!

Butch:

They totally are. History (which of course had no sex or violence at all) and humor no one gets. Yup. Nothing so offensive as underage sex and suicide. I mean, if they had that, would that fourth grade class at Alcott Elementary be able to put on Romeo & Juliet every year? Of course not.

Feminina:

NO WAY would Romeo and Juliet be so universally hailed as great art if it had any unpleasant things in it. Shakespeare has got our backs in terms of inoffensive content. As far as anyone can tell through all that old-fashioned poetry talk, anyway. Everything said by old-timey folk in charming old-timey speak is automatically unobjectionable!

Butch:

Exactly! That was all before we had gay people and internet porn, so of COURSE everyone was chaste and kind and happy.

Speaking of swords (as we so often do), swords are nasty things. I took Butch Jr. to fencing yesterday, and two of the real top notch olympic hopeful pros were in there going at it before Jr.’s class. It was the first time I had seen, or more to the point HEARD fencing at that level. It is fast, brutal and loud. He loved it.

And then he hurt himself. Yup, first sports related injury. He fell during warm ups and fucked up his right thumb real bad. His coach told him to sit out the real sword drills, which made Jr. think he was in trouble, so instead he said he was fine, suited up and fenced (see that brutal loud thing above?) with a sword in his bad hand for 40 minutes. It swelled up so bad he could barely get his glove off (which is why no one noticed that he was hurt. They were BIG fucking gloves.) He couldn’t unbuckle his seat belt when we got home.

Sigh.

Feminina:

The 17th century: when goodness, morality and common human decency ruled!

OUCH, sports injury. Working through the pain is a good sign of determination, but not good for feeling better in the long run. Hope it improves quickly. Sore thumbs are no fun.

Butch:

He’s not too heartbroken, as I had to send him to school with a note explaining that his writing would be affected.

Watch he’ll come home and bash it with a hammer just to make sure that continues all week. And then it’ll get miraculously better on Saturday when he’s allowed to play minecraft.

Feminina:

Milking it for all it’s worth! An important skill.

Butch:

He’s good, he is.

Learned it from a master.

Feminina:

He’ll go far in life. He’s got all the important stuff down already. Milking injuries, swordplay, looting, video games…

Butch:

All by the time he’s nine. Welp, my work is done.

Feminina:

Turn him loose! Get him a house with a bed in it, have Lydia drop in once in a while, he’ll be fine.

Butch:

I fear what he’d do with an alchemy table.

Feminina:

Just start him off with a basic forge, then. No one can get into trouble with a forge!

Note: potential spoilers about DAI relationship stuff and the story collection “The Last Wish”

Butch:

Talked to a bunch of dudes last night, but still need more chatting in Skyhold before I’m off again. Cole didn’t tell me why he disapproved. Chatted up Cassandra re being the divine, neat stuff, themes, will ponder. Told Cullen not to take Lyrium, but did it in a friendly way. Spent some time with Sera. Did you get “Friendly roof time?” Cuz that’s awesome. She’s a great character. One of the deeper NPCs they’ve ever done.

Still have to touch base with Varric, Leliana, Solas, Vivienne, Dorian, and…..Morrigan. Then off to…somewhere. Emprise de Lion, I think.

In other news, grabbed Transistor, which is supposed to be very, very excellent (and short) off of PS+ recently.

Feminina:

Yeah, I was friendly and supportive with Cullen, and told him to stop because he can be the better person he wants to be that way, or whatever.

I did not get any friendly roof time with Sera. Siiiiigh. “Transistor”…on the machine for if I finish up Life is Strange and inFamous in a timely fashion. Short is good.

Started Life is Strange last night, speaking of. Interesting so far. The ‘rewinding time’ bit is a lot like the way you could rewind and adjust memories in Remember Me, only here it’s reality instead of memories. It’s an interesting mechanic. Haven’t gotten to much plot yet, but can already see that some choices I’ve made will come back to haunt me. (You can only rewind up to a certain point, so you still have to live with your choices eventually.) Mostly so far I’ve walked around talking to people who sneer at me, and then taken bits of information from the conversation to redo it, but impress them by knowing what they’re talking about.

There are a number of kind of “hey, you’re not a poseur after all!” comments from people I’ve impressed that way that are kind of cutting. Like, actually I am a HUGE poseur, just an effective one because I’ve figured out exactly what you want to hear…a possible theme there, I think, like maybe there will be some exploration of who you really are compared to who you can present yourself to be, how we’re all sort of posing all the time, or something. We shall see.

Also, MAJOR themage in the Witcher stories, which I’ve almost finished. Heavy duty “who are the real monsters” questions, mistreatment of elves/native races, how to deal with the fact that the world is changing, etc. I feel all prepared for that game now.

Butch:

All the Sera scene is, is the back of your heads gazing out over Skyhold as she says little one liners, but they aren’t just snarky funny. She’s reflective, and it’s very well done.

Good you grabbed Transistor while it was free. See, this is the old Steam gamer in me. Grab it when it’s cheap, play it later. It ain’t going anywhere.

Life is Strange: Interesting in a good way or not? More importantly, is it enough of an improvement over Remember Me that we can count Dontnod as an up and comer? I’ll check it out if I ever finish DAI.

Yeah, there are serious, SERIOUS moral grey areas in TW. And yeah, elves might have it bad in DAI, but they have a damn picnic compared to TW (did you meet Iorveth in the books? He was the elf rebel leader. Unlike Brialla, who was sympathetic, Iorveth was pretty much a terrorist, which led to more interesting questions).

There’s also a whole lot of big nationalistic themes. I mean, TW2 dealt with a small kingdom unwillingly caught in a territory war between two big empires that was populated by an ethnic minority (elves) facing genocide at the hands of either of the conquering nations. Considering CDPR is Polish, I wonder what all that could be?

TW was really the only Western game I’ve played (we’re not counting the Japanese stuff which is it’s own thing) that really felt foreign. They do not make stuff for the US. There were lots of times I was like “I’d get that more if I were Polish, I think.”

The games are not slaves to the books, though.

Feminina:

Grabbing while free is good, until you run out of storage space. Which we did on the PS3, making me wary, although it hasn’t been a problem yet on the 4. We had to delete a ton of data to make room for Tomb Raider on the 3. Totally worth it, of course.

Definitely interesting in a good way so far. You’re a senior in high school and your main problems so far are the fact that you’re in high school and people are horrible and you’re having trouble with your school work. Which could sound boring, but is actually pretty interesting: just talking to people, figuring out who’s where in the social hierarchy. Then there’s a kid you see with a gun, and a lot of ‘missing’ posters for a former student, and of course the fact that you can rewind time, so clearly something’s going on. I’m inclined to order episodes 2-5, but I’ll wait until I actually get farther into this one first, just in case it all falls apart.

But the things I found frustrating about Remember Me were mainly mechanics issues related to combat, and there hasn’t been any combat here so far. I would definitely keep an eye on these folks in future. Although…why can’t I nod, people? WHY????? Ha.

No Iorveth in the stories, but there are some elves who are secretly trying to figure out human agriculture because the plants they used to eat in the forest aren’t growing anymore (“the sun doesn’t shine the way it used to” has been repeated a couple of times, and some magical plants don’t grow well now). They’re planning to kill Geralt and Dandilion to keep their secret, and you feel bad for them because they’ve been driven from their lands and now they’re starving, but also they’re going to murder two people who just happened to see them, and who have not personally done anything to them, so you can’t feel that they’re RIGHT. The old problem of conquered territories. “Yes, your ancestors were here first, and my ancestors wronged them terribly and you’re still suffering for it, but you wronging me and a bunch of unarmed farmers now doesn’t fix that.”

Butch:

Remember, you can uninstall and keep your saves in PS+. I mean, you gonna play AC4 again? Please. Plus these bitty games are bitty. Not exactly 50 gig installs.

The high school plot beats the whole “save the world” “dude with gun” stuff. I’m inclined to support it just for that.

No combat…Hmm. Another reason to support them. I mean, your first game has combat because, well, it’s a game, right? Then you have the guts to say fuck it, we’re going to do what we’re good at. Nice.

I don’t know why foreign companies like to do tricks with English. Or set their games in the US. France is nice. French is nice.

Nice complexity. Dandilion (dumb name) pops up quite a bit in the games. There’s even some indication that he’s telling the story (he’s writing the codex, for sure, but it’s unclear and ambiguous if he’s “writing the game,” a la Varric in DA2). I like that they had a codex that’s being written in game, as it were. Nice touch.

Feminina:

Remember Me was set in Paris…which was cool. The future-Paris setting was one of the things I liked about that game. I read that the developers find themselves inspired by settings, and that the Pacific Northwest just felt right for the story in Life is Strange. Maybe soon they’ll be inspired by Paris again, but with less annoying combat!

Dandilion IS a dumb name. There’s an interesting tension in the stories between sort of hackneyed ‘high fantasy’ names and language, and then more silly names and really grubby, down-to-earth situations, dry humor, the “twisted fairy tale” references, and of course the dense, gray-area political stuff that is not exactly a staple in the Tolkienesque style that he sometimes seems to be emulating (mocking?). I’m not sure to what extent this is intentional, and/or a product of the translation, and/or something that would make a lot more sense if I understood Polish, but it’s interesting.

Butch:

Ah, right, Remember Me was Paris. Forgot. We need to see more of that sort of thing. There’s all sorts of places that would lend themselves to settings.

I have heard that the Witcher translations are, at best, rushed and half assed. I mean, they weren’t translated at all until the success of TW2 (and the fact they weren’t might lead one to believe these aren’t exactly high literature). The author himself is both arrogant and bugfuck crazy (he has repeatedly said that George RR Martin plagiarized him, something no other human on earth seems to think), so there ya go.

Good thing the games aren’t slaves to the books.

Feminina:

It’s a little-known fact that George R.R. Martin speaks fluent Polish. And really, what better source to plagiarize from than someone 99% of your audience has never heard of and doesn’t have a chance to read because he hasn’t been translated? This story seems totally plausible to me. Ha.

Rushed and half-assed translation could account for a lot. I could also believe that the writing in its original form is perhaps more pulp awesome than literary awesome, not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Future Paris was a cool setting. I would totally play another game set in that same world, but with less annoying combat and fewer giant robots.

Butch:

That’s something he said! He’s nuts. He also hates the game. He has said so. Because they are not slaves to his work. Despite the fact no one would care about him but for the game. People.

We will never know what sort of awesome the books are, as we don’t have the time nor the inclination to learn Polish. But then, with all these snow days at the beginning of the year, maybe we did, and just missed it.

Man, you’re going to be talking on those robots for decades, aren’t you?

Feminina:

I WILL NEVER FORGIVE THE GIANT ROBOTS.

Although to be more accurate, I should have said “fewer giant robots I have to fight,” because I’m not necessarily opposed to giant robots that merely exist, maybe build cars or whatever–the ones I hate are the ones I have to spend four game sessions fighting. So that was a blanket dismissal of an entire class of entities, when really I only hate one specific subset.

My bad.

But perhaps my vast hatred is similar to the hatred of the author of the Witcher books for the game. And hey, whatever. We don’t all like everything, and if you believe that a game ruins the work of your imagination, I acknowledge your right to your opinion. That must kind of suck. “I did this awesome thing and someone else ruined it!”

Others may not agree that it’s been ruined, however, and once you put something out there (especially if you sell the rights, as I suppose he did), you kind of give up control of how it’s going to be read and interpreted.

I hope the royalty checks help make up for the pain.

Butch:

Indeed. Very intolerant of you. We have an equal opportunity blog. We don’t hate here.

But man those robots gave you issues.

Someone ruined his work after they made him famous outside of Poland and paid him a shitload of money. Sorry, not much sympathy. They didn’t just make the game, you know. They bought the rights.

Control is for sale. Don’t want people to change it? Keep the rights.

Feminina:

I hated that robot SO MUCH. Incandescent rage.

It’s a well known fact that the originator of a work also doesn’t always have the best idea of what’s an appropriate expansion of that work. See: Lucas, George. Selling Star Wars was the best thing he could have done for that universe. Even Disney can’t do any worse than he did himself.

Likewise, it’s entirely possible that the game does as well at developing his universe as Andrej Sapkowski himself did or does, at least in the eyes of the people who are going to pay for the product.

Butch:

Man, didn’t you ever hate that thing. I have no real rage things. Closest I got was that car chase scene in LA Noire where you started pinned between a car and a lamppost and the dude kept getting away.

And man, George Lucas. I suppose if you’re going to have one really, really good idea, have it be something that makes you a billionaire. Better than poor us, having so damn many good ideas that have not made us billionaires.

I think the Witcher is a pretty damn great game universe. One of the best, really. Even better than Thedas (though the ME universe is pretty awesome, as is the Fallout universe). But the Pontar Valley is pretty damn great.

Me too! I can’t use it…but it’s rare so I want it! We’re suckers for marketing. In practical terms, what the hell difference does it make if it’s rare? NONE! And yet…”rare”…it has that special sparkle…

Suckers for marketing.

Butch:

It also leads to the problem I had more than once at the ball: See, usually you equip, you keep all that on until you find something that might be better. But I have so much shit that each time I had to gear up at the ball I had no fucking idea what we were wearing. I knew Evelyn, but for the rest it was “Was it superior hunter coat or reinforced scout mail?” No idea. I think I get Vivienne wrong cuz she was a tank in the apartments and died about nine times on that last rift. And of course I rushed cuz I wanted court approval (I did win the “Gain the full approval of the Orlisian court trophy. Boom!)

Feminina:

I know, that was a mess. Who was wearing what? I don’t know! Here, take…this, I guess! I didn’t get that trophy. I should have lingered longer over the early parts, eavesdropping and chatting, to get the approval up. Instead I was tracking down clues and getting in fights and then, oh, I guess that was the last clue and now the final sequence has been triggered.

Oh well. They don’t like qunari anyway so I started at a disadvantage…I’m not going to grovel for their favor, damn it.

Butch:

Yup. Got it to 100. Whoo hoo! I’m awesome.

Still not getting a platinum.

Feminina:

Well, not if you don’t put in the effort to complete it at nightmare level! Which is totally the next thing on my to-do list.

Butch:

Yeah no.

Though I gotta admit, combat is, for the most part, turning easy. Maybe that’ll change in the hissing wastes. I’m sorta tempted to turn it up to hard, if, for no other reason than I want to get my skills tuned for TW3, which, if it’s at all like TW2, will be harder than this. TW2 was hard.

Still on normal. Only turned it down to easy at that trebuchet, and haven’t really hit a reaper moment yet. Which is interesting, as reaper moments were coined due to a bioware game, and the Branka fight is probably the biggest reaper moment of my life.

Feminina:

Yeah, it was mostly pretty easy for me by the end. Dragons and occasional trolls-with-friends were about the only thing that could really bother us by then. As I said elsewhere, it started to feel like a stealth casual mode, turning down the difficulty just by making sure I was tougher than everything. I considered turning up the difficulty, but…enh. I figured I was more in it for the story than the combat anyway, and while a good, tense, close fight is exciting (and there were still some of those!), I’m not into long grinding battles.

The Hissing Wastes has some pretty tough opponents, though. It took me a while to start mopping the desert sands with them. (A singularly ineffective pastime, mopping sand.)

Is the combat system in TW similar enough to DAI that it would work as practice? What if you just get into some habits that work really well here and don’t help you at all later?

Butch:

Hmm. If it’s similar to TW2, then it does have many similarities in terms of targeting, attacking, using abilities in real time. The caveat is that Geralt is pretty much a warrior, and a one handed warrior at that. Feels far more witchery when I take control of Cassandra or Blackwall or Bull (though mostly Cassandra, as she’s the only one I’m using as a one handed specialist). I usually control Evelyn, as she is me and can close the rifts, but maybe I’ll start using Cassandra as my Geralt stand in. Evelyn stays back too much to really be a Geralt type.

But that is, if it’s similar. They’ve already added some mechanics like a crossbow. Geralt didn’t really do missile weapons in TW2 (he could buy daggers, but they were really hard to use and expensive. TW2 was the only game where money was ALWAYS scarce. Never that moment where, all of a sudden you were richer than hell).

Feminina:

I hope it’s the crossbow from “AC: Brotherhood.” Damn, I loved that thing.

I’m reading “The Last Wish,” a book of short stories about the Witcher. Not bad. The author seems rather inclined towards female monsters so far.

Cassandra was my only sword-and-shield fighter too. She sort of came that way, right? And I think I had better 2-handed weapons available than one-handed swords and shields when I met Blackwall and Iron Bull. Good shields are kind of hard to find.

Butch:

I never got to experience that crossbow. Though I did love my pistols. And smoke bombs. The world needs more smoke bombs.

“The Last Wish” is by the guy that wrote the books? Look at you doing research. Female monsters….hmm….well, harpies, that Succubus….Not sure that translated into game. Most of the monsters were pretty genderless. Except the harpies. Man, I hated those harpies.

One of the good things about the witcher is a serious lack of gear oriented loot. Look, I love loot, I do, but I like low maintenance loot. Get, sell, repeat. Or loot that gets used like potions or bombs. Armor? Weapons? Then you get all comparey. The Witcher does not fuck around much with such things. I think in TW2 I changed swords maybe four times, armor maybe three. And it’s pretty damn obvious when the new thing is better. The loot you find is either money, stuff that is easily turned into money, or potions/craft items (there are a lot of craft items). This, I like.

Feminina:

Smoke bombs are pretty awesome. Even when you throw one by mistake because you forgot you had them equipped. Not that this ever happens.

“I totally meant to do that, random villagers!”

Yeah, Andrej Sapkowski. I’m sure a lot of things don’t transfer exactly to the game, but it’s sort of a sense of what the world might be like.

It’s easier to do non-weapony loot when you’ve only got one person to worry about, I bet. With a whole troop of companions, constantly upgrading peoples’ equipment can be a meaningful activity. With just you…”is this better than what I have?” Yes/no, done. Not really much room there for excitement.

Butch:

I have the same problem when I’m exiting out of the options screen and hit circle one time too many. I have that linked to static cage. “Ok, I saved the game and ZAP!”

You’re ahead of me. I never read the Witcher books. Are they written well at all?

That too…easier to have it be an important activity when you have a lot of people to upgrade. You can’t do anything with anyone else, at least not in TW2. I admit, people didn’t like that aspect of DA2, but I did. Streamlined things. I don’t like to micromanage. Put on your own damn armor.

Feminina:

I was constantly hitting circle to ‘back’ out of conversations I didn’t actually need to exit from (i.e., the requisitions officer). That was mapped to my double-daggers lunge, so I’d be politely chatting and then suddenly pounce at someone, slashing with my daggers. I assume I figured out mid-lunge that they were harmless and pulled my strikes, since I never actually hit anyone. People must have started giving me wary looks behind my back after a while, though.

I enjoy a bit of micromanaging when it’s there, but I don’t mind when it’s not. I was totally fine with its absence in DA2, but I think it’s kind of fun, and didn’t mind doing it in DAI. So basically, whatever they want to do is fine with me. Although, as we discussed previously, I would enjoy a system where people would actually speak up about looted items (like in the video! “ooh, I could do so much with this ring!” …and yeah, sometimes I might take it myself anyway, but not always!).

The writing is OK. A little stiff, maybe, but that could be the translation. Or just the style–a lot of high fantasy is a little stiff. Lots of references to classic fairy tales (Cinderella, Beauty and the Beast, etc.).

Buttons, you make some awesome points (see previous post). It’s good to be reminded that behind every seemingly ill-fitting game moment is someone doing the best they can with the limited options available to them.

I’m intrigued by your point that games are a different medium than we’re used to. In addition to mechanics, I think maybe the extent to which you feel as if you ‘own’ a story comes into play.

For example, novels are usually perceived as being a solo effort by one, named entity, rather than a faceless mass of ‘devs’ towards whom one might direct generalized ire. The author is seen as the ‘owner’ of the story and characters, and even if a reader doesn’t like the direction the plot is taking or the way a character is developing, you don’t really take it personally. “I didn’t like the ending of that series, but whatever, I didn’t write it.”

Movies feel more similar to games in that they both require a team effort, and many members of the team will necessarily appear to viewers as nothing more than a name in the credits. Still, the director is often seen as the author of a movie, and allowed a certain ownership of the story, and actors may own characters to some extent, and take much of the criticism for perceived flaws (“Halle Berry should never have been Storm, that should have been Angela Bassett”).

In both cases, someone else is in charge, so movies have in common with books the fact that the consumer never has an illusion of control over the progression or outcome of the story.

On the other hand, the participatory nature of games makes players feel like part of the story in a way that a reader or viewer won’t. Even though I’m not actually creating anything in the game, I feel like an active participant in the unspooling of the narrative, and this might give players a particular sense of ownership of a game’s characters, story and presentation that readers and viewers might not have.

I also agree that, as you say, the fact that there’s not just one standard way to make a game, and that after finishing a few games players will have all kinds of different methods for accomplishing things in their heads, probably makes it easier to criticize the visible mechanics of games than it is for non-film-experts to criticize the fine points of why a shot was filmed from a certain angle or whether that cut to Character B was the best way to get across the point that he’s the target of A’s murderous rage.

The visual language of films and TV is familiar enough to viewers that we can accept a lot of conventions without needing them spelled out for us, and there’s not a comparable ‘language of doing things in games.’ Maybe this makes players especially likely to speak up about things that don’t match their own ideas for a game’s narrative: why did they do this thing that way, it would have made more sense to use some other means of getting to that point, etc.

It’s hard to imagine getting to a point where traditions have solidified to the point that such a uniform language exists across games (blue-highlighted object always means helpful item, red means weapon, or whatever, and if it’s different you know it’s an artistic statement), but as you say, the medium is young.

I look forward to checking out Assassin’s Creed 80 on my implantable PS-BrainChip in the old folks home to see how things look by then.

I think you’re more troubled by missing out on the nuances than I am. I got to the end of AC4, thought “what the hell? oh well, must not have been important,” and shut down the game.

I feel like if it’s not important enough to be in the game proper, it’s not important enough for me to care about. Yeah, I don’t know who Haytham’s mother is or why Edward’s daughter goes by her mother’s maiden name, but if the game doesn’t see fit to tell me up front, then I don’t care enough to find out.

Is it in a novel? Great! I wish the people who do care much joy of it. I’ve got other things to do.

Obviously, those details about Edward’s later life are not relevant to the entire rest of the game we just played, and if they become relevant to some future game, I trust the writers will catch me up on it enough that I know what I need to know to play that one. If they don’t, then yeah, that’s a definite flaw in that game, but if it’s some out-of-game detail about some woman we never met who married a character we never liked that much anyway…the theater cut isn’t always the inferior version of a story. A lot of things get left out because they don’t actually matter.

I do agree that including hints of these extra details (which, as noted, are completely irrelevant to the actual game we just played), without filling in the story, is a little annoying and probably a deliberate teaser to entice people towards the added content, but whatever. It has no impact on the gameplay of AC4, so I see it as more of a “but wait, there’s more!” notice than anything.

It’s like Nick Fury telling Iron Man that he’s putting a team together (so everyone come back later for more movies!) at the very end of the film. If you know, you’re like “OMG Avengers!!!!” and if you don’t know you’re like “what the hell?” but either way it doesn’t really have anything to do with the way you see the movie you just finished watching.

Butch:

We feel this way because the game was THAT game. Imagine if there was a game where we cared deeply about the story (say, DAI) where you had to do other shit to get the details. We’d be steamed. We weren’t invested in the AC story. I LIKE the TR story. I want to follow it. And I don’t want to read comics to do so.

And that was the ENDING of the game. The very end. This wasn’t some throwaway scene. I mean, if the book was talking about, say, how Anne and Mary got caught, perhaps, ok, fine. Book if you care. But to have the ending of a game (or movie, or book or whatever) come out of nowhere and expect people to know something from some other source is ridiculous. The ending!

A cliffhanger is one thing. I’m ok with cliffhangers. But to have a complete left turn at the end is just cheap and silly. You want to entice people to come back for more? Cliffhanger. Tried and true. But randomness? Silly.

What AC did would be like the last scene of Iron Man being a shot of Nick Fury talking to Thor and saying “That was just like the time when Captain America ate that taco!” and them laughing.

Feminina:

Yeah, but…I guess I don’t see that the missing ending info in AC4 actually mattered very much. Even if I cared about Edward, the end is basically a flash-way-forward, here’s-how-he’s doing clip that tells us:

a) he’s still alive

b) he’s apparently doing fine for himself (nice clothes, opera)

c) he has a son and his daughter is still around

So, he’s doing fine, everything worked out for him, the end. I don’t NEED to know the rest of the story.

Yes, it’s a bit obnoxious of them to make a point of the fact that his daughter doesn’t use his name but not tell us why, but I don’t have to know that. Yes, his son’s mother isn’t there, but I don’t have to know where she is.

These details are not relevant to the basic message, which is: he’s doing fine, everything worked out for him, the end.

I’m good with that. And this ability to ignore the extra details is why I can be blithely unworried about secrets in DLC.

Butch:

Still, our forgiveness of this crap is because that game spent 50 hours or so making sure we didn’t care a bit about Edward. Pure, distilled apathy. Tastes like smoke bombs.

The details are not relevant because…. well… the plot wasn’t all that relevant.

Feminina:

I appreciate your stronger need to know, though. You’d make a better detective than I would.

Me: So you say you didn’t kill this guy? Well, that’s good enough for me. I’m sure he probably just tied himself up and stabbed himself several times with a knife covered in your fingerprints. Have a nice day!

Butch:

Like that scene in the douglas adams book where a dude is found in a windowless room, locked from the inside, sitting in a chair with his head on a LP turntable thirty feet away and its ruled a suicide.

This is why mystery games fail.

Feminina:

Well, that case had Dirk Gently working on the explanation, so clearly it was suicide. I mean, unless you’re interested in a theory about how he’d signed a contract with an infernal being and it had come due at just that moment…

I actually kind of love that book. Mystery games should be a lot more like that. Just because there’s a lot of supernatural weirdness going on, doesn’t mean it doesn’t have to make sense.

You: Wait a second, something about this tied up stabbed dude in a room locked from the outside doesn’t quite fit…

Me: Oh come on, this guy SAID he didn’t do it. What more do you want? I’m sure there’s a logical and completely irrelevant explanation for his daughter using her mother’s maiden name when she purchased that giant knife for him, and I’d rather go play something else than figure out what it is.

You: …still not quite satisfied here…

Me: [already out of the room purchasing wine]

Butch:

Ah. I get it. The remedy for bad narrative is apathy and booze…..

Wait… now that I read that, that’s pretty much the remedy for anything, isn’t it?

Yeah, I’m not personally that into this sort of additional content. I mean, if people want to do it, whatever (hey, it gets people reading!), but I usually don’t find it very interesting.

There was a Dragon Age novel that I read (actually I think there are several, but this was a DAO prequel about how Alistair’s father became king), and it wasn’t that good–I think the writer just didn’t have a great sense for how to pace a novel, as opposed to a game, or something–so it was a very ‘meh’ experience. (Sorry, David Gaider. Love your game work!) Possibly the later ones got better, but I just don’t care enough to find out.

What I like about Dragon Age is playing it as a game. I don’t NEED explanatory codices in novel form giving the backstory of minor characters: I barely read the in-game explanatory codices!

I think the books and comics and mini-movies and whatever are all extras that may be perfectly fine, but are probably not that relevant, and I just don’t care. Basically I feel about them the same way I do about DLC: great for people who want that kind of thing, but not really a big focus of mine.

On the upside, I’ve never heard of them containing any information that was critical to any game, so I think we’re fine ignoring them.

I mean, there are about 8,000 Star Wars novels and I’ve never read any of them, and it’s not as if I can’t say I’ve seen Star Wars, right?

Butch:

yeah, but I fear that feeling I had at the end of AC4 where I was like “wait, what? Who’s that son? Who’s the mother? What?” and found out it was in the novel. THAT sucks. I agree: if it provides some extra context you want, great. But if you play the game and say “huh?” cuz you didn’t read the novel/comic/web piece etc., that sucks.